Heavy
By Marianne Bennet
The glassy material of the cockpit windows fogged over as Brianna gently guided the stolen shuttle down into Telos's atmosphere. Surrounding the ship was the milky white color that so often characterized blindness. The hue, or lack thereof, was reflected in Kreia's eyes. "Good," said the old woman. "I knew there would be a use for you. Bring her down, handmaiden. Quickly but quietly."
Flurries of snow blurred Brianna's vision; she waved a hand as though to brush them away only to realize that the snow was on the other side of the glass and there were tears still lingering in her eyes. She observed that fact blankly as she tried with difficulty to make out the craggy peaks of the ice cap. "Why the need for secrecy?" she asked, attempting to sound innocent and biting down a sarcastic reply. Forcing herself not to look at Kreia, she added, "It isn't as though Atris is waiting for us."
An invisible hand jerked the Echani's head back. "There is no 'us,'" Kreia hissed. "There is no 'we.' There is only myself and what I look to accomplish. I have no need for you to be in the picture much longer. Know this. Understood?"
"What of… the Exile?" Brianna forced the words out from between her teeth. "Where did he fit into the equation?"
"Karis?" She flinched at the name and Kreia smiled as though Brianna's pain brought her amusement. The old woman continued. "Does it hurt to hear his name, child? Would it hurt more still to hear what he truly was? No one save perhaps Revan knew him so well as I, though many claimed my understanding, your Atris among them. You would do well to make good on this opportunity."
"You claim to know him but there must be matters he kept private, even from you!"
"Do you think so?" Kreia's voice lowered as her hold on Brianna's head relaxed. "Then know this: he is a survivor, like me, and no one but another survivor might know him for it. He'll run from a fair fight and hide in the tall grass at the edge of a battlefield, wait for an opportunity to strike from behind and only when he is certain will he make his kill. You have borne witness to his skill; how long did it take him to seduce you?"
"He never so much as kissed me, Kreia," Brianna shook her head slowly. "He never did anything to imply a seduction."
She chuckled, low and comfortably. "I hardly speak of physical matters but of a seduction of the mind, though I suppose that, what with a young girl like you and a handsome man like him, physical matters may have followed. It matters little. If you cannot see his hold over you, then his power is great indeed. Speaking of power, he doesn't want it. No, Zeke Karis is not that kind of man. He's attracted by power; he does not want it, only wants those who have it. And you, handmaiden, do not have it. He would have tired of you quickly; you are lucky to be free of him."
"Lucky," repeated Brianna. "In what way am I lucky? I left my home, left everything I knew, at the bidding of one Jedi to spy on another. I saw things that were better left unseen, struggled with myself day after day, night after night, over whom I should trust and who I should become, struggled to gain a peace of mind I so craved only to have it ripped away from me with his death –a death caused by you!" she flung the words at Kreia as though each were a knife. "And you call me lucky?"
"Lucky to have your heart broken by my actions rather than by his!" Kreia fired back. "How long do you think it would be before you lost him? He was a man who loved danger, the hunt; you are far too easy prey for his liking. He had you… and then he would have turned to another, the assassin maybe, the huntress perhaps? Not the handmaiden. Never the handmaiden. You are lucky that I have done what I did. He would have been a much slower, more painful death for you, handmaiden. What a shame you cannot see the great gift I have given you."
"No shame but mine," replied Brianna tonelessly. "I have given you my help in opposition to my heart. And yet, just two days ago I could not see the division between my head and my heart though it had once been so clear. Now my feelings have returned to such clarity and yet I have lost my peace of mind. It will not come back now that I know what it was like before, will it?"
Kreia was silent for a moment. "No, it won't," she finally said, "but rest easy, child." She began to move away from the pilot's chair. Then, more to herself: "Besides, if Tobin follows through with his intention, soon such matters will be beyond you, as they are beyond me."
She watched ice crystals splinter across the windows as the old woman exited. In any moment now, the boxy silhouette of the Jedi academy with its four pillars would come into sight and Brianna's sense of dread would increase further. Already, the Echani knew that there was something very wrong though she could not put a name to the wrongness. Whatever it was that tugged on the corners of her mind, deception and conceit were woven into the very fabric of its nature, elusive just as Zeke had said Revan was–
A deep pain resounded within Brianna. Each of Kreia's words had been a knife thrust into already open wounds and the mere thought of the Exile smarted like ocean water sprinkled upon each gash. She pushed the pain down and hid it somewhere deep between her ribs and lungs.
Idly, to distract herself and yet with the attitude of picking at a scab until fresh blood bursts forth, she wondered if the others knew yet. She imagined Bao-Dur waiting patiently for a general who would never come back, of Atton and Mira waking up entangled in each other's arms and realizing that the man who had brought them together was gone. She did not envy them the time they might spend pacing the plains of Dantooine, running through the Ebon Hawk and calling out for him, his name echoing in the hallways of the ship he had loved so well even as the sound echoed through the corridors of Brianna's consciousness.
She had not slept since Dantooine for she knew that if she did she would dream of him. Even as Brianna sat in the pilot's chair and the academy came into sight, her eyelids grew heavy. She forced her eyes open wide. No more dreaming of the dead, she told herself even as she thought she could hear the cracking of her own resolve. The memory of him, her memory of him, felt heavy like the weight of water pressing down hard. She did not wish to think of him but think of him she did. If his death affected her so, no matter what Kreia said, did she love him?
"It does not matter whether you loved him or not," said Kreia suddenly as she returned to the cockpit. "What mattered was whether he loved you."
"I know he did," Brianna whispered; it came out more as a sigh.
"That does not matter much either. How much? Numbers are the currency of the galaxy, not words and their underlying meanings. How much is what counts. How much power, how much love, the quantity is what matters. We deal in concrete evidence and solid fact."
"Not you. You deal in lies and illusions."
The old woman smiled a wanly, her smile like the waxing of the moon. "And I am a dying breed."
"If you are dying out, it is because you have betrayed all others of your kind."
"We may be dying but we are certainly not dead yet and our method of reproduction lies in the supplanting of thoughts and ideals. We have time aplenty." Kreia's lip curled. "You call me betrayer but, if you knew my story, you may question who is the betrayer and who is the betrayed. Land there."
Brianna did so. The shuttle came to a halt at the center of the icy plateau. Kreia reached over Brianna's shoulder and flicked the switch that lowered the landing ramp. "I believe I will be able to enter the academy unhindered."
She rose but hesitated. "What of my sisters? They must still be there with Atris."
"They will prove no obstacle to my progress," she threw over her shoulder as she turned away. "But, were I you, I would not stray from this ship."
No! Brianna wanted to shout. You may think me your servant but I am not! I came to deposit you at your destruction; I will be present to see your ruin. You call yourself betrayer but, before this is done, we will see who the betrayer is and who is the betrayed. I will see your ruin complete!
Instead, she met Kreia's gaze and nodded. The old woman studied the Echani's face for a moment and finally said, "If it brings you any last comfort, he thought of you at his last," and then swept away.
Brianna did not wait long to follow.
…
Some perverse curiosity drew the Echani to her old room. Now, standing in the doorway of the closet-like chamber, she marveled at the size of what had once been her living space; it was little more than a cell at best, a cupboard at worst, somewhere to store cleaning equipment. With amusement, she wondered if she was a broom to Atris and, if so, was Adele a vacuuming device? She began to laugh but stopped herself. Methodically, she checked every room in turn. No one was there, not even a sulky Alianne, and that worried Brianna. Had Kreia dispatched each of Brianna's sisters so quickly?
"If so, it matters little," she said aloud and listened to her words reverberate throughout the chamber. "It matters little," she said again. She had lived without a mother, without a father, what was one more gaping hole in her heart where there had once been something? Again, she forced herself not to think of the Exile; she would not deal with that now. Yes, she could survive without sisters and that was the only kind of surviving that Brianna allowed herself to think of.
Suddenly overcome with a sense of loss that was truer than any of her false reckonings of late, Brianna sunk down onto her bed. A sadness akin to paralysis swept over her; she had never before felt so heavy, so much like a rock half buried in sand as the tide pulled over her. Oh, why did he have to die? Why could she not go back or at least beg the Force to let her switch fates with him so that it would be Brianna who knew death? At least then, he might have known how much she–
"No more," she told herself sharply, speaking aloud and caring little about who heard her. "If he is dead, then I am dead. If he is dead, then my heart is in the grave with him. I live, but I do not live. I do not want to live. I do not want to live in a world without him."
"But you do live," a voice seemed to float into the room, a voice akin to Kreia's most persuasive tones, more melodic but at the same time harsh and commanding. "You do live and so does he."
Brianna rose and lifted her chin, always ready to meet a challenge no matter what that challenge may be. Her blue-gray eyes darted into every corner of the room, seeking a speaker and finding none. "Who are you? Show yourself."
Adopting a clipped, chiding, and confident tone, the voice said, "Now that wouldn't do, now would it?" An invisible hand pushed Brianna back onto the bed. "You never were very grateful for the gifts given to you, less grateful to the givers, and it is a vice that has been cultivated within you, not by yourself but by others. You once were so clever, so talented, but now I fear that your sight has failed you. You have digressed. You are blinded by grief but it is a grief that is illegitimate. The source of your grief does not exist. It is an illusion."
"And who are you to tell me what is and isn't an illusion?"
"Who do you trust? Do you trust that witch that has led you here?"
"She did not lead me here; I led her!"
"That's what you think," said the voice quietly, gently, "but she knew the path to this place quite well, too well. You do not know what she is, what she is capable of. Do you think she is powerful? She knows if you do and then she is an old woman in your eyes. You then think her an old woman; she knows there is power for her in your blindness. She is always what you think she is not. She can be innocence personified when in reality she is the other side of snow." The voice paused and Brianna chose that moment to leap off of the bed.
"Do you think me ignorant of the fact that Kreia lies? I know she lies; this is different. She needs me this time. You think me manipulated but that is not the case. I have no value to her other than the vechicle which she employs to gain access to this place! Hinder me no more, vision; I must go and do what I came here to do."
"You are blinded."
"I can see!"
The voice did not say anything for a moment; then: "Could you?" It paused. "Would you? You underestimate your pull over him were you used as bait. Would he not come for you were you in danger?"
"He is dead." The words felt wrenched from her throat. "Do not dare to tell me otherwise; I did the right thing. And I do not know if he would come for me."
"He would," said the voice firmly. "You know that. Do not deceive yourself, Brianna; that is a service others are too willing to supply. Do you now see your true use to her? You doubt what she had made you believe even now and wisely so. Will you act on it? That is the question: will you act on your doubt?"
"One should wait to act until one has all the answers; suspicion alone is not enough," answered Brianna tonelessly.
"You've already acted on suspicion once; do not be pert with me. Will you act?"
Brianna stared at her hands for a long moment; only then did she look up. "I feel as though there are two voices in my head, neither of which I trust. I cannot seem to even trust my own thoughts; fear that someone has tampered with my motivations is overwhelming. I can't seem to even be able to distinguish between what I know to be true and what I want to believe. I would he was not dead; by the Force, I wish he were not dead and I fear that I am allowing my longing to get the better of me. I do not trust you, as I do not trust Kreia, as I do not trust myself." She laughed softly. "Truthfully, it is nothing personal."
"Can you not understand what I am trying to tell you? You sit in a well of grief, refusing to see your own salvation. I do not know what perversity of feeling drives you to believe otherwise but he is alive. Kreia never destroyed him; she merely manipulated you into believing that she did."
"I fear him being alive as much as I fear his death," confessed Brianna quietly. "What place is there for me in his life if he lives? He would be my ruin."
"Kreia was the ruin of the three Jedi masters. He was not. He will not be your ruin, just as she was not his. Do not allow her to be your ruin either."
Brianna flashed a grim smile. "I was ruined from the moment I saw him," she said bluntly, "but it was a ruin that I not only allowed but perpetrated and encouraged. And, if I could go back, I think I would do it all over again. Disillusionment was a kinder teacher than others, though I was a most unwilling pupil."
"There are all kinds of ruin," replied the voice diplomatically, "just as there are all kinds of teachers and, as with teachers, some are better than others. There is something to learn from Kreia, just as the Exile has learned from her, but you cannot allow her to hold you back." The voice paused. "If what I have said is not enough, at least find the answers for yourself. I would never want any child of mine to take a witch's words at face value."
"Wait." Brianna looked up. "Mother?" But the air that had felt so full of… something only moments ago now felt dank and dark, heavy but empty all at the same time. She got up again. Her legs felt like something akin to concrete but their weight was nothing compared to the heaviness and newfound weariness of Brianna's heart. But still, buried beneath that well of emotion was the unmistakable desire to do something.
So she started running.
She sprinted through the ill-named Jedi Academy she had once called home, past the training room and the cell block, heartbeat thudding up into her ears where it made uncomfortable residence. Brianna ran, the soles of her boots battering down upon the hard floor, her steps echoing through the corridors. Usually, she moved silently; this was one of the few times she recognized that her step truly had some weight to it. So she ran some more and found herself in the mockery of a council room that Atris had created for herself.
Mockery indeed, as Atris had spent more time in her meditation chamber than anywhere else. But yet Brianna wondered if Atris did sit in the council room from time to time and, if she did so, did she reflect on the memory of those who had been lost or did she imagine herself grand master of a new Jedi Order?
Coming to an impromptu standstill and nearly losing her balance in the progress, she found herself gazing at the sterile, gray surroundings with an attitude that was as much bewilderment as it was caution. There was something drastically different and foreign to this place, a shadow that lingered in corners and doorways. Something nibbled at the corners of Brianna's sight and hearing, again something malignant in nature that she could not quite name.
It was in this fashion that Brianna was so distracted that she did not see the first of her sisters to appear.
She emerged from the shadows as though she had been a part of them all along though she was a ghost in silver and white, a vision in white, Zeke had once called Brianna. It had sounded as though he had been quoting something when he said it; she had always meant to ask him about it. In truth, what was the difference between a vision and a ghost? If Zeke appeared to her, would it be as a ghost or a vision or something else entirely? He had called those visions in the garden "imprints;" she had seen the way he had looked at Maria Starlight. She wondered idly if he had looked for her imprint in empty spaces. She wondered if she would spend her life listening for the Exile in echoes.
A voice brought the Echani jarringly back to ground. "So, you returned after all."
She met the gaze of the first sister without flinching; it was a struggle, her eyes felt so very heavy. With a start, she realized with shock and horror that she could not identify whether the speaker was Serena or Lyra. What a thing, to not recognize one's own blood! Still, Brianna stood her ground and met the handmaiden sister's eyes. "In a fashion," she replied with something of a carelessness better suited to Atton or Mira. She swallowed. "Where is Atris?"
"You came here with another," said Brianna's sister. She was not to be dissuaded. "Who is she? Why did you bring her here? Why did you think for a moment that you could return, let alone reveal our secret location?"
"I've hardly revealed you," objected Brianna. "She's been here before."
"She came here with the Exile," another, taller sister appeared. Dark shadows around her eyes betrayed exhaustion. "She came before. It was the day he came here and our sister left us."
Adele, Brianna remembered. Had her eldest sister really changed so much? There seemed a hunch to her shoulders that had not been there before. Had the creases around her eyes always been so worn? Had her face always looked so much like a mask? It had not. Something in Adele had changed. Something, decided Brianna as she gazed around at her five sisters, in all of them has changed.
"And what of the Exile?" asked a third sister more provokingly. "Has he accompanied you? Does he lurk in the shadows behind you like some poisonous snake waiting to strike?"
"No," Brianna squared her shoulders as she spoke. "I brought none with me save she that has already passed through here."
Perhaps motivated by the desire to inspire shock in her sister Clytemnestra, perhaps because saying it so many times and to so many people would quell the doubts lodged in her heart, perhaps to give Zeke some hidden advantage unbeknownst to her at that time, she said, "No matter. He is dead."
Her words had quite the opposite effect. Clytemnestra's smirk crumbled but not in the fashion Brianna had hoped. Now she sneered. "And now you entertain us with lies. Well, we are sufficiently entertained. Have you anything else to offer us?" Before Brianna could answer, she continued: "I know you don't; we all know you don't. We all know that you've come to us as his disciple, come to preach and to inject his venom into our veins. Atris has already forewarned us; we will have none of it."
"Atris," said Brianna again. "Where is she? Have you already allowed Kreia access to her?"
"We allow nothing that our mistress does not command," intoned one of the sisters that were not Adele or Clytemnestra dully. "She sought counsel with your companion and we facilitated discourse, as Atris desired. When she wished that the woman be granted safe passage away from this place, we granted that as well and she departed much in the manner of which she arrived."
"She never once said that she had a companion," said Clytemnestra to Brianna accusingly. "This must be dealt with."
Brianna's knees locked. Kreia was already gone; suddenly, the one-time handmaiden was five years old again. "Please, take me to Atris."
"To what purpose?"
"Discussion," answered Brianna. "Reconciliation, perhaps. Understanding of what has happened and what is to come."
"You say many things, little sister," replied Clytemnestra, "but very few of them have any meaning to our ears. You are foreign, little one, last of the handmaidens, and your words have little more substance to them than the whistling of the wind or the babbling of a stream."
"Please, let me see your mistress," she said, casting her gaze about and watching a new handmaiden sister step forward from the shadows. "Please take me to Atris."
"'Our mistress?'" said that handmaiden sister with a quizzical expression. "Why not your mistress as well? Brianna–"
"Sister!" barked Clytemnestra but the youngest of the handmaidens save Brianna ignored her.
"Where did you go?" continued Alianne as Brianna remembered her. "Where did you go? You left us here, never said a word to any of us as to where you went, Atris never said anything, where did you go? Where did you go, that day so long ago, and what did you do? Why did you leave me?"
"And why have you returned?" asked the sister who had been the first to arrive.
She looked at her hands before saying, "You already know the answers to those questions. I thought Atris had told you I had left on a mission for her. I traveled with the Exile; now he is… dead and I seek audience with Atris. Would you deny me?"
"What do you seek, last of the handmaidens?" asked Adele, pacing as she did so. "Security, confirmation, what are you looking for in coming back to us?"
"I know little of what those words mean to me!" snapped Brianna. "I seek understanding which only Atris can give me!"
"Or do you seek judgment?" said Clytemnestra. "That service we might grant you."
"Sister," said Adele, "what of Atris?"
"There is no need for Atris," she replied scathingly. "This is a simple matter of… discipline, one that can and should be dealt with among the Echani. I would say among family but she is no relation of ours, not anymore. Either way, there is no need for Jedi intervention."
Horrified, Brianna replied, "How can you say that? I'm your sister!"
Alianne appeared doubtful. "Sister…"
"Alianne," Brianna reached out to her.
"Stop!" said Clytemnestra, turning on Alianne. "You know your oath, sister. You know what you have foresworn. You have promises to keep. Do not allow the traitor to tempt you away from your path. We know our duty, don't we sister? You have relinquished your name; do not forget it."
"Forget what?" said Brianna when she could not stand it any longer. "How can anyone remember anything if one chooses to lose one's own identity? That name was given to you, Alianne, by our father. Did he hide from his own name? He loved us and named us all for a reason. Would you forgo his legacy? Clytemnestra?"
"By choosing to honor one part of ourselves we do not necessarily choose to dishonor another," mused a handmaiden. Alianne remained silent.
"And why call me traitor?"
"That fact is indisputable," Adele finally spoke up. "You are deemed a traitor by your actions and, being a traitor, should be considered no sister of ours. You defy the ways of the Echani by traveling with a Jedi. I see you went so far as to carry a lightsaber," she observed, looking at Brianna's belt.
"I have done no worse than our father!"
"You carry a saber and no other weapon," mused another sister. "Our weapons and battle stances are our way of life."
"Just because I honor one part of myself does not mean I dishonor another!" Brianna retorted. "This is not a matter of honor; it is a matter of tolerance! How can you not understand that one person can owe loyalty and love to more than one sector or… or person! Divisions can exist in harmony."
"And to whom do you owe love and loyalty to besides your family and those to whom you are sworn?" taunted Clytemnestra.
Brianna met her elder sister's eyes. "I have formed bonds the likes of which I see now you cannot comprehend." Clytemnestra moved forward as though to strike the younger woman but she merely ducked out of the way. "I am not like you, sister. I went away. I am different than you, from all of you, and I am not ashamed of it. If you chose to say I am no sister of yours, choose to exile me, so be it. I will make my own way. But do not hinder me any longer. Adele, grant me an audience with Atris as you did for the one who came before me."
It seemed a long moment before anyone spoke. Then Adele said, "Atris does not wish to see you. She knows what you have done, what you have become, and she is done with you."
"Knows what I have become?" Brianna repeated. "But how? And what does she mean? I have done nothing to dishonor her, nothing that could be taken or even perceived as offense! I have only done what I know to be right; will she not see me?" Tears began to flood her silver-blue eyes. "Will she not look on me? Will she do nothing?"
"You betrayed us, sister," said Adele, "and are subsequently sister to us no longer. Will you say anything further before we dispense judgment upon you?"
"This is no trial," she replied even as the shadows of empty council seats loomed overhead, "and you are no masters to judge my actions. There is but one judgment I would succumb to and it does not belong to any of you!"
"Indeed, you have succumbed too much," said Clytemnestra. "What you say and do now is no doubt due to a prior ministration of his. You succumbed to his tricks, his lies, and his manipulation. His poison flows in your veins, contaminates your body, outcast; these words are merely symptoms of the disease that inhibits your actions."
"You are blind, Clytemnestra. All of you are blind. There is something in you that you cannot see, something in all of you!" Brianna caught her breath. "And if I am an outcast, I would rather be an outcast than a poor, blinded thing like you!"
That was when Clytemnestra launched herself at her younger sister.
Brianna found herself shoved to the ground where she was victim to a series of well placed blows but her lightsaber still flew into her right hand. Drawing upon the Force to do what her reserves of strength could not, she pushed herself back up to her feet. She staggered two steps to her left, ducking as a quarterstaff was swung overhead. Fighting with the Force was different' it was as though she could see a shadow of where someone's hand would be in a moment and yet see where it was now all at the same time. Not long after Clytemnestra attacked, the other four handmaiden sisters fell into the fray.
Her movements seemed to belong to her no longer. She swept through the battle with steps unfamiliar to her feet, a combination of Jedi blows and Echani stances that flowed and meshed together in utter and complete symbiosis. She did not know for how long she fought' time flowed seamlessly around her, its passage only marked as one handmaiden sister fell to the floor and then another. Brianna kept moving; her actions were quick and deadly but she was never out of breath. Battle with the Force at her side created a serenity within her that could not be shaken by any physical blow her opponents could deal.
When the last handmaiden fell, Brianna was standing. With a jolt, she realized that, even with the combined power of all five of her sisters, they had proven no match. She stared into nothingness for a moment, stunned by this revelation. When she had gathered herself, she knelt beside the nearest crumpled sister –Clytemnestra –and whispered, "When we fought, you aimed to kill. You would have killed me; you would have killed me in a heartbeat."
The elder woman suddenly coughed and Brianna jumped back in surprise, face painted with wariness and distrust. Clytemnestra made no movement to strike. "Will you not do the same?"
For a moment, Brianna's pulse leapt. The chance to be rid of her scornful and cruel elder sister forever… it was an opportunity that Brianna might have leapt for not too long ago. But at what cost? Killing someone? What if that someone had made her life miserable since the age of three, mocked her, hit her, pushed her down every chance she had, abused her in nearly every sense of the word? But… kill her?
"I have every right to," said Brianna through clenched teeth. "You know what you did. You know that I have every right to!"
Clytemnestra coughed again. Blood trickled from the corner of her mouth. She laughed softly. "Ah, but you won't, you see," she replied before closing her eyes again.
Shaking her sister's shoulders to keep her awake, Brianna demanded, "Why don't you cry, sister?" It had been a question Clytemnestra had asked of her many times. "Why don't you beg, sister? You should be begging me for your life, sister; why don't you cry?"
Her voice rang throughout the chamber. Her sister cracked a smile. "Because I don't want to," she said bitterly and slipped back into unconsciousness.
Brianna loosened her hold on Clytemnestra's shoulders until her sister fell to the ground. She rose to her feet, her blue-gray eyes roaming the room, counting the white-clothed bodies around her. They numbered four; had one escaped? No matter; Brianna would not kill them, not any of them, not in cold blood, perhaps not even in the heat of battle. Why should their deaths weigh on her conscience? It was more than that. Something Zeke had once said finally rang true in Brianna's mind: "I tried to hate him… He was trying to kill me, after all; I had every reason to hate him. But I… couldn't."
"I think that there are more powerful emotions than hate in this galaxy," said Brianna aloud. She reached down, felt Clytemnestra's pulse and, assured that the beat was steady and sound, said, "You're right: I won't kill you, though you would not do the same service for me."
"Or is it a disservice?" murmured a voice behind Brianna. The Echani turned and Atris moved out of the shadows. "Have you done your sisters a disservice by leaving them their lives? There's a lot that you don't know, Brianna. Are you trying to be the heroic Jedi like Revan? Like the Exile? Like your mother? What are you trying to accomplish by these actions, Brianna?"
Brianna took a step back. "Me?" she asked. "What am I trying to do? What am I always trying to do? Who was I always trying to be? Do you not know? How can you not know?" There was a tremor at the back of her throat but she caught it and answered her own question: "You. It was always you."
"Me?" exclaimed Atris, releasing a sharp bark of laughter. "Me? Why in the galaxy would you ever want to be me? You're such a child, Brianna; you haven't learned anything, have you, Brianna? Why would you ever want to be me?"
"Isn't that what you wanted?" she replied, a hollow sound in her voice. "You wanted to remove my heart and replace it with ice, just like yours. Are you not satisfied with your creation?"
"I never claimed ownership of you, child, nor do I see you as any creation of mine. I have nothing but scorn for you," said Atris coolly, electricity beginning to crackle at her fingertips. "You could never be me, Brianna; I merely allowed you to think that you could be. You lack the capacity, the discipline…"
Brianna shook her head with a small smile. "No. It was nothing lacking in me at all."
A stream of blue lightning extended from Atris's right hand toward Brianna's heart in a crackling flash. Brianna narrowly avoided it by throwing herself to the left. Breathing heavily, she crouched behind the center stone as another burst of lightning hit the ceiling.
"How long?" she heard Atris demand. "How long did it take you to betray me? Months?" Another crash rang throughout the chamber. Brianna sprinted across the room, looking for new cover as Atris moved from her original position. "Weeks?" A third streak of blue hit somewhere up in the shadows. "Days?"
"I didn't betray you!" shouted Brianna as she leapt over Adele's crumpled but still breathing form and quickly ducked behind a pillar. "At least not in the manner you accuse me of!"
"Did you go so far as to accept his teachings?" The pillar began to topple and the Echani dove to the right, narrowly escaping being crushed. "Do you believe his lies?"
"No more than you believe Kreia's!" cried out Brianna as she flung herself out of the way of yet another bolt of lightning. "Look at what she has done to you!"
"I see nothing but my own potential." Atris's blue eyes glowed like the bolts she hurled. "She has done nothing save reveal to me what I am to become. I shall be greater than the Exile, greater than Revan!"
"Are you insane?" snapped Brianna from behind a row of council seats when she could stand it no longer. "Do you really believe that Kreia wishes to usher in a new dynasty of Jedi under your command?"
The crashes of lightning ceased for a moment. "No," said Atris musingly, "but I know where she does and I shall send the Exile after her. Then, there, they can destroy each other in the core of Malachor V!"
"You will do no such thing," she retorted in response, stepping momentarily out into the open. "I would die first!" That was when Atris caught her off-guard.
"So, you feel that way about him, do you?" said Atris as Brianna was suddenly bathed in crackling blue light, sending her body into convulsions. "How far would you go for him, hmm? You would die for him then?"
Brianna meant to plead but could not find the words; pain smothered her throat and lungs.
"So, tell me truthfully: how long was it? How long was it before you fell in love with him? How long was it before you shared his bed?"
The pain was all consuming but, in a brief moment of clarity, Brianna thought she saw the Exile in the doorway but quickly dismissed it as a hallucination and drifted along into blackness.
…
She regained consciousness but chose not to open her eyes. If this was death, this was alright. There seemed a pleasant drowsiness encapsulating her body and her mind and her thoughts had a lightness that they had lacked in previous hours. Even better was the opportunity to not think at all so she banished consciousness from her mind and allowed her weight to fall back down into the arms that held her…
Arms. Holding her. Brianna returned jarringly to the present.
Her eyes flew open and she was instantly lost in a sea of browns and golds with slight flecks of amber and green drifting across like boats lost in an ocean: Zeke's eyes.
"I thought you were dead," he said, a look of relief washing over his face.
She attempted a smile but ended up wincing instead as she whispered, "I thought you were dead."
"Far from it," he said in a voice that was slightly hoarse and then, very gently, evaluating the expression in her eyes and the reaction on her face, he leaned down and kissed her very softly.
Brianna found herself leaning up to meet him, arching her back; more than that, she found herself kissing him in return. It began hesitantly, gently, but then turned into something more frenzied, more desperate. Then, he made as to pull way but, making a noise of objection, she reached up for the back of his head and pulled him back, winding her fingers into his hair. He willingly complied. Finally, only then did they release each other and, even then, not fully, not quite letting go of one another.
"Why didn't you wait for me?" he asked, brown eyes hazy.
"I thought you were dead," she repeated incredulously, truly smiling now.
Indignantly, as though proving that he was very much alive and well, he kissed her again. This time, Brianna broke the kiss and pulled him close. Wisely, Zeke did not say anything more and merely held her, letting the silence surround them. Words seemed very unnecessary; they could look at each other and know what and where they were. But, after some time had passed, Zeke murmured, "We need to go."
In that sound, the moment dissipated and the memory of the past few hours rushed back to Brianna. Zeke got up and then pulled Brianna to her feet. He did not let go of her hand as she looked around and asked, "What happened to Atris?"
The corners of his mouth turned downward. "You mean after she tried to kill you? And me?"
"Yes," she swallowed. "After that. You didn't kill her, did you? Because I would not have wanted that."
"Of course, you wouldn't," said Zeke with a heavy sigh followed by a grim smile. "I didn't kill her, much as I may have wanted to when I saw you crumple to the ground. She's in her meditation chamber now, with your sisters I think. Do you want to see them?"
"No, I don't," Brianna said very quietly. "I do not wish to see her or any of them. That part of my life is over. I wish to move forward, with you."
He looked at her a little strangely. "Are you sure?"
"Yes," she replied and, as she said it, she knew she meant it. "Let us leave this place. I presume that Kreia is gone."
With a nod, he confirmed that was the case. Then Zeke hesitated again. "I never even asked if you were alright."
"Physically, I am fine though I can sense a migraine coming on," answered Brianna with a slight shrug. "Mentally, I am stable as well. Emotionally, however, I am confused. I'm not sure of where I stand. Do you love me?"
The words were out before she could stop them, logical analysis interrupted by emotion. She flushed and glanced downward, waiting for Zeke's response.
"What do Jedi know of love?" Zeke seemed to force his grin but stopped trying when he saw Brianna's face. "The truth is that I don't know where I stand either. What is love to me? I used to think it was manifested by the inability to live without that person at your side but then I went out to the Rim and figured out just how easy it is to prove myself wrong. What I feel for you is… different but… Honestly, I don't know, Brianna." He tried smiling again. "There: a cryptic answer to what shouldn't be an enigmatic question; I'm getting more and more like Kreia every day. What do you mean? What d you feel for… me?"
Brianna bit her lip and decided that it was better to deny at this point than to lay herself out on the line for another cycle of betrayal; Kreia's words suddenly had more matter than before: "Then I suppose it is fair to say that I don't know how I feel either." She didn't meet his eyes. "Come, what happens next?"
They began to retrace their steps back through the academy. "We go to war is what happens next," said the Exile grimly, suddenly transformed into a man of battle. "Kreia has drawn the first of our three enemies to this place, Telos."
"Then you do realize that she is the third of our enemies, don't you?" asked Brianna.
"I rarely think of anything else these days," he replied, "except when I think of you," he added with another grin.
Brianna wanted to smile too but she realized that Zeke had changed again in those last few moments, had become cautious where he had been so bold only minutes before. Could it be because she had asked him if he loved her? Had she moved too quickly? But he had seemed to certain when he had kissed her and Brianna felt she had done nothing save respond in kind. That moment had gone by so quickly and Brianna's familiar sense of confusion settled in like a well-used mantle about her shoulders, a familiar weight now doubly heavy. What did he want from her anyway? Yet she kept on smiling despite her worries as he talked on of what Atris had said to him and the plans he must make. Was he going away from her so soon? Would he take her to Malachor with him?
They approached the Ebon Hawk and her heart leapt in her throat. Force, how was she going to look Atton, Mira, or Bao-Dur in the eye? Zeke caught her gaze and very quietly said, "They were all worried for you; I was worried for you. No one blames you, Brianna."
No one but herself, she observed. She nodded and then replied, "Please: not yet."
He nodded too, understanding, and then guided her up the ramp and through empty hallways until they entered the cargo hold. They passed by Atton and Zeke nodded to his pilot who then turned and went in the direction of the cockpit. A few moments later, Brianna could feel the ship begin to take off. Zeke didn't say anything; he merely shut the door to the hold behind them.
The Echani roamed her old territory, checking each of her belongings in turn, letting her hands rest gently upon a familiar swath of gray fabric before turning back to the Exile as he said, "Will your sisters be alright?"
"What?" she asked in confusion, her fingers still clutching at the silvery material ever so slightly.
"Should we have gone back for them? I should have thought of all of this, I suppose, but when I came in and when I saw you, everything just… melted."
"They'll be alright," said Brianna, still staring at the gray robe. "I didn't hurt any of them… much. And Atris is there; she won't hurt them, any of them, not like she did…" Me. "I should go and–"
In two strides, the Exile crossed the space between them and gathered her into his arms. "I'm sorry I didn't get there sooner," he whispered into her hair. "I wasn't sure. But I came, Brianna."
"And I am glad you did," she tried to tell him but he would have none of it and pulled back away from her.
"I've never really gone chasing after someone the way I did with you, not in a long time. Before I woke up on Peragus, I'd gone a long while without caring for anyone, least of all myself. But then you came into the picture and sent me veering off into a new direction. You put me back on course and, hell, if I don't know what the word 'love' means, maybe we can define it. Together."
He cleared his throat as though he were embarrassed by his own words. "Where are you going again?"
Brianna reached for Zeke's hand, crossing the distance between them. Entangling their fingers, she smiled up at him, returned to that same level of certainty, and replied, "Nowhere."
"Then maybe I should go nowhere too," he said softly.
"I don't care where I'm going," said the Echani to the Exile, "so long as I'm with you."
"Um, Zeke?" Atton's voice came over the intercom. "Apparently, we've got a wee problem."
Zeke stepped back from Brianna again and said, "Go on." He winced at the Echani but she shrugged with a smile.
"Citadel Station is under attack from an unknown enemy."
He bit his lip. "Plot a course for the station, Atton." He glanced apologetically to Brianna. "I have to go."
"Come back to me," she replied.
He showed her a lopsided grin. "I always do." And then he was gone.
…
A/N: Sorry it took so long to get this out. I was in tech week for a show and writing a play and making major life decisions –you know, the day to day. I'm really happy this is out and off my chest. Please review; it always makes me so happy :) -MB